My quest to see every vertebrate

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Tag Archives: Northern Gannet

Last year’s trip to find Dovekies didn’t quite pan out, so I signed up for another pelagic adventure earlier this month (my 10th trip into the ocean to see birds and cetaceans!). We headed out of Lewes, Delaware in hopes of finding a few good birds and maybe a mammal or two.

The weather was better than I dreamed of for mid-February: nearly 50°F, calm winds, and partly-to-mostly cloudy skies. The seas were only 1-2 feet most of the day, and fog and rain held off until nearly sunset.

Sunrise on the Thelma Dale V

The trip started before sunrise, and as we bee-lined for deep water we started seeing flocks of scoters scattering here and there. Despite seeing hundreds of birds, I was unable to positively identify a single bird to species.

Unlike last year’s trip, this boat had hundreds of pounds of chum on board, so it wasn’t long before the leaders brought in a nice, big gull flock to join our adventure. Hundreds of Herring Gulls cycled through, along with good numbers of Great Black-backed Gulls, a few Lesser Black-backed Gulls, and a pair of adult Iceland Gulls. Later, a few Black-legged Kittiwakes would make brief appearances, but none joined the big group of gulls looking for handouts.

I spent almost all of last year’s trip glued to the bow, so this year I opted to try my luck on the upper deck. The upside was I could quickly move to any side of the ship without having to go through or around the cabin. The downside was it difficult (at first) to pick out birds on the water, and it wasn’t the ideal angle for photographing wildlife that was on or very near the surface. However, it was a fantastic vantage point from which to photograph our gull and gannet companions.

Lesser Black-backed Gull

Iceland Gull

Iceland Gull jettisoning its ballast.

Northern Gannet

Of the ~2200 photographs I took on the trip, I think this is my favorite.

One thing that stood out through the entire trip was just how massive the ocean is. Growing up in the Midwest, I always just assumed that if I went out to sea there would be whales and dolphins to see anywhere I looked, but that’s just not the case. It was surprising just how difficult it was to even see a Fin Whale, the world’s second largest animal, when it surfaced relatively nearby.

One tiny Northern Fulmar and one gigantic Atlantic Ocean.

Truth be told, I prefer marine mammal sightings over just about any bird I might see at sea. Luckily, we ended up with pretty good, albeit brief, looks at Common Short-beaked Dolphins, Fin Whales, and Humpback Whales. After the trip I learned that some saw Risso’s Dolphins. Had I known I’d missed them on the boat I’d probably have been gutted, so I’m glad I didn’t learn of that until several days post-trip.

I’m quite proud that I was able to guess at where this Common Short-beaked Dolphin was going to jump while we were moving forward at full speed.

I never would have imagined it would be difficult to find a Fin Whale, the world’s second largest animal, in a camera lens.

This whale eventually showed its fluke, helping cement its identification as a Humpback Whale.

Most of the time you just see a few puffs like this. The exhalations left an oily residue on the surface of the water that was very easy to spot.

Despite my love for marine mammals, the only reason I really signed up for this trip was to see a Dovekie. Dovekies aren’t really all that pretty. Just a little, roughly robin-sized black-and-white bird that hangs out in the open ocean all year. But I really wanted to see one. We kept heading farther and farther out. The water temperatures were plenty warm and deep, but all we saw were Atlantic Puffins. We couldn’t believe how many puffins there were!

Out of ~20 Atlantic Puffins on the day, this may be the only one I had a decent look at.

Most of the puffins were seen in flight, exploding away from the boat.

As we pushed farther than planned, someone spied a Dovekie flying! But I missed it. That was not a good feeling. It was nearly time to turn around. But we kept pushing, and another cry of “Dovekies! Flying at 2 o’clock!” went out. And I missed them too. It was starting to look like I’d be making reservations on a January/February 2019 trip.

Just a little bit to go to get back to the car.

Then we hit the mother lode of Dovekies! First one, then two, then twenty, then upwards of 230 Dovekies! You couldn’t look in any direction without seeing at least a handful of Dovekies. To me, they looked like little fleas bouncing around the low swells. Many were gorged on fish, so they were not as aerodynamic as they might be in leaner times. They had to try to run up the small waves to take flight, which often only lasted a few yards before they crashed back down to try again. Before long we were hearing little pips and trills…I never dreamed of getting to hear a Dovekie!

Trying hard to get airborne, but this Dovekie soon skipped to a landing.

Dovekie!

In what seemed like an instant, but was probably more like 30 minutes, we had to turn around and head back for Lewes. I was sad to leave the Dovekies, but then my favorite North Atlantic pelagic species, the Northern Fulmar, put on an excellent show! A pair of birds spun circles around the boat for over a minute, causing me to run back and forth across the top of the boat hoping to get a photo or two that was in focus.

“Fulmar” comes from the Old Norse word for “foul gull.” Supposedly, this is in reference to the fetid stomach oil fulmars might vomit on you if you get too close.

We ended up spending over 13 hours on the boat, and it was a much better trip than last year’s 8 hour jaunt out of northern New Jersey. I’m not quite convinced I’m ready to try an overnight pelagic, but I may just have to sign up for a 2019 winter trip after all.

Back in 2006, I was living in upstate New York. After growing up in the Midwest I was finally close enough (~5 hours) to the ocean to take a pelagic birding trip! Naturally, I signed up for a winter trip out of Lewes, Delaware (I was afraid to drive to NYC) as soon as I could. As luck would have it, that trip was cancelled.

Fast forward to 2015, when we moved from Missouri to Maryland. Again, I’m finally close enough (~2.5 hours!) to the ocean to take a pelagic birding trip! I was the first person to sign up for the January 2016 trip out of Lewes, Delaware…which was canceled due to 10 feet high seas on the day of the trip! Luckily, it was a pretty warm day for January and my friend Kate and I had a pretty decent day of land birding.

I thought about signing up for a summer pelagic trip, but we were planning to move last spring/summer, and I wasn’t sure if I’d have time. Plus, I really wanted to see a Dovekie. I eagerly awaited the release of the 2017 pelagic trip list, and I was a little relieved when I saw there was no winter trip out of Lewes, Delaware. I figured out that Belmar, New Jersey was the closest winter trip to me, so I signed up for that one.

This year, the weather could not have been more perfect. Temperatures were in the low 40s, winds were light, and I’ve been on kayaks in choppier lakes than the north Atlantic was that day.

Still, in order to get there on time I had to wake around 3:00 AM, drive 3.5 hours to the coast, then stand around until it was time to board. Luckily, there were a good number of birds to watch in the harbor, and I even met someone from Cornell who was familiar with my name through eBird!

The harbor was full of Brant and Mute Swans, with a few American Black Ducks, Red-breasted Mergansers, and Bufflehead milling around the edges. Someone pointed out a distant Peregrine Falcon perched atop a nearby bridge, and a Boat-tailed Grackle was spitting sound from atop a moored boat. All this before we even left the dock!

Needless to say, I was pretty excited to be standing up front along the bow railing as we departed. However, I was quickly reminded just how hard it is to pick out birds sitting on the water even in a tiny 2 feet swell. And most birds in flight stayed pretty far away, so it was tough to ID species I have limited experience with (and none in the past several years).

A group of White-winged Scoters took off as we approached.

Black Scoters flying well off our bow.

Luckily, the trip leaders were excellent in calling out birds and giving directions as to where the bird was/was heading. We even lucked out and had a Razorbill just sitting off the port side of the boat a few minutes into the trip!

The best look I had at a Razorbill all day.

It was quickly apparent that this trip would not be like the boat trips I’d taken in California, Alaska, or even Ireland. We would often go long stretches without seeing anything but the odd Herring or Great Black-backed Gull. The trip operators were not able to procure any chum for the trip, but they did bring a large box of beef suet on board. Unfortunately, that was used up pretty quickly.

On the plus side, when we did have suet to throw overboard it brought in a lot of gulls, including a potential Thayer’s Gull (I feel like it was an Iceland Gull, personally). I briefly glimpsed a very distant Black-legged Kittiwake, but just barely.

My first Iceland Gull in 2833 days, but who’s counting?

Great Black-backed Gulls were kings of the wake.

No matter how many times I see them, I will never tire of watching Northern Gannets plunge into the ocean like giant lawn darts.

The real highlight of this trip for me was the marine mammals. A couple Harbor Seals popped up near the boat early in the day. Later, I missed seeing a couple Harbor Porpoises, but about halfway through the trip I saw a Fin Whale surface a couple times! I couldn’t manage a photograph, but it was pretty cool to see my first Fin Whale since July 6, 2006!

A Harbor Seal slowly swam past the port side of the boat, but I was stuck on starboard. When I got around to the stern this was all I could see of the seal.

I was lucky enough to see several pods of Short-beaked Common Dolphins, which became life mammal number 92! Most of them were swimming within about 50 yards of the boat, but some even went bow-riding for a bit.

These Short-beaked Common Dolphins were way too fast for me to get a solid photo, but at least I got something!

Of course, I took my GPS with me on this trip to get an idea of how far out we went. Turns out we did a total trip of somewhere around 70 miles, getting just barely over 28 miles offshore at our farthest point.

New York City is just off the map to the north.

As we were disembarking the Peregrine Falcon went screaming after a Bald Eagle, the rat of the sky. It was a fitting end to the day. All in all, it was a great trip. I ended up with a lifer mammal and added about 20 species to my 2017 list!